Richard Davis Winters (January 21, 1918January 2, 2011) was an American businessman and decorated war veteran who served as an officer in the United States Army during World War II. He is best known for having served with and later commanding Easy Company of the 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, part of the 101st Airborne Division. He received quick promotions during the war, eventually being promoted to major and placed in command of the regiment's 2nd Battalion.
As a first lieutenant, Winters parachuted into Normandy in the early hours of D-Day, June 6, 1944, and later fought across France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and eventually Germany. After Germany's surrender in May 1945, he left the 506th and was stationed in France, where senior officers were needed to oversee the return home.
In 1950, during the Korean War, Winters was recalled to the army from the inactive list and briefly served as a regimental planning and training officer on staff at Fort Dix, New Jersey. After volunteering and completing training to become a Ranger, Winters was issued orders for deployment and was preparing to depart for Korea, but instead left the army under a provision that allowed officers who had served in World War II but had been inactive since to resign their commission.
Winters has been featured within numerous books and was portrayed by English actor Damian Lewis in the 2001 HBO mini-series Band of Brothers.
Early life and education
Winters was born in New Holland, Pennsylvania, to Richard and Edith Winters on January 21, 1918. The family soon moved to nearby Ephrata, and then to Lancaster when he was eight years old. He graduated from Lancaster Boys High School in 1937 and attended Franklin and Marshall College.
At Franklin and Marshall, Winters was a member of the Upsilon chapter of Delta Sigma Phi fraternity and participated in intramural football and basketball. He had to give up wrestling, his favorite sport, and most of his social activities for his studies and the part-time jobs that paid his way through college. He graduated in 1941 with a B.S. in Economics. He obtained the highest academic standing in the business college.
Military service
World War II
Training
On August 25, 1941, Winters enlisted in the Army. He would write in his memoirs that he "had no desire to get into the war" but joined to fulfill a one-year requirement of service and to avoid being drafted later.
In September, he underwent basic training at Camp Croft, South Carolina. He remained at Camp Croft to help train draftees and other volunteers, while the rest of his battalion was deployed to Panama. In April 1942, four months after the United States entered World War II, he was selected to attend Officer Candidate School (OCS) at Fort Benning, Georgia. There he became friends with Lewis Nixon, with whom he would serve throughout the war. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the infantry after graduating from OCS on July 2, 1942.
During his officer training, Winters decided to join the parachute infantry, part of the U.S. Army's new airborne forces. Upon completing training, he returned to Camp Croft to train another class of draftees as there were no positions available in the paratroopers at that time. After five weeks, he received orders to join the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment (506th PIR) at Camp Toccoa (formerly Camp Toombs) in Georgia. The 506th was commanded by Colonel Robert Sink.
Winters arrived at Toccoa in mid-August 1942 and was assigned to Company E, 2nd Battalion, 506th PIR, which later became better known as "Easy Company" in accordance with the contemporaneous Joint Army/Navy Phonetic Alphabet. Serving under First Lieutenant Herbert Sobel, Winters was made platoon leader of 2nd Platoon, earning a promotion to first lieutenant in October 1942 and made acting company executive officer, although this was not made official until May 1943. The 506th PIR was an experimental unit, the first regiment to undertake airborne training as a formed unit. The training at Toccoa was very tough. Of the 500 officers who had volunteered, only 148 completed the course; of 5,000 enlisted volunteers, only 1,800 were ultimately selected for duty as paratroopers.
On June 10, 1943, after more tactical training at Camp Mackall, North Carolina, the 506th PIR was attached to Major General William Lee's 101st "Screaming Eagles" Airborne Division. Later in the year, they embarked on the Samaria, and arrived in Liverpool on 15 September 1943. They proceeded to Aldbourne, Wiltshire, where they began intense training for the Allied invasion of Europe planned for spring 1944.